Profile: Dr. Raynard S. Kington

Raynard S. Kington, M.D., Ph.D. was named Acting NIH Director of the National Institutes of Health on October 31, 2008, following the departure of Elias A. Zerhouni, M.D. Since February 9, 2003, when Dr. Kington was appointed Deputy Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), he shared in the overall leadership, policy direction, and coordination of NIH biomedical research and research training programs of NIH’s 27 Institutes and Centers with a budget of almost $29 billion and 18,000 employees.

Prior to this appointment, he had been Associate Director of NIH for Behavioral and Social Sciences Research since September, 2000. In addition to this role, from January, 2002 to November, 2002, he served as Acting Director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Prior to coming to NIH, Dr. Kington was Director of the Division of Health Examination Statistics at the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). As Division Director, he also served as Director of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), one of the nation’s largest studies to assess the health of the American people. Prior to coming to NCHS, he was a Senior Scientist in the Health Program at the RAND Corporation. While at RAND, Dr. Kington was a Co-Director of the Drew/RAND Center on Health and Aging, a National Institute on Aging Exploratory Minority Aging Center.

Dr. Kington attended the University of Michigan, where he received his B.S. with distinction and his M.D. He subsequently completed his residency in Internal Medicine at Michael Reese Medical Center in Chicago. He was then appointed a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania. While at the University of Pennsylvania, he completed his M.B.A. with distinction and his Ph.D. with a concentration in Health Policy and Economics at the Wharton School and was awarded a Fontaine Fellowship. He is board-certified in Internal Medicine and Public Health and Preventive Medicine. In 2006, Dr. Kington was elected to membership in the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.

Dr. Kington’s research has focused on the role of social factors, especially socioeconomic status, as determinants of health. His research has included studies of the health and socioeconomic status of black immigrants, demographic correlates of the willingness to participate in genetic research, the relationship between wealth and health status, the health status of U.S. Hispanic populations, and the determinants of health care services utilization. (NIH Bio)